Hip hop music has been popular in Africa since the early 80s due to the widespread of African American influence. In 1985 hip hop reached Senegal, a French-speaking country in West Africa. Which there were also some groups in Tanzania and other countries that emerged before 1989, such as Kwanza Unit; although it was not very well known in Tazania. During the late 1980s to mid 1990s, Stevano UGO, Lagos, Nigeria hit “Earthquaking African MC” became the first Afrobeat rap Artist playing on radio Ray Power FM released via Kennis Music. This sparked the awareness for rappers to escalate all over Africa. Each region has a new type of style of Hip Hop, with a new genre based on house music was developed in South Africa in the 1990s. Hip Hop the genre itself was created by African Americans during the early 1970s in Bronx New York. Since then, African Hip-hop and Rap has made male or female rappers all over Africa. Most of the Female rappers were rejected in the society cause of the image of the movement Rap/HipHop in the World, but now Africans understand that Rap is bringing education and love from real and wise rappers.
Afro Hip hop in Nigeria and most part of Africa started back in the late 80's and early 90's. The first place hip hop gained popularity in Nigeria was in Lagos, Nigeria. During this time (1980s), it was a military governorship in Nigeria. The period of military governorship brought crisis in Nigeria which involved the devaluation of currency, loss of jobs and persistent unemployment especially for new graduates from the University. Hip hop during this time was used as a means of escape by youths from the country's crisis. It was made popular by using Nigerian languages in the lyrics along with traditional hip hop beats, such as those made by the founding fathers of hip hop, DJ Kool Herc, Afrika Bambata and Grandmaster Flash. Since there were very few record labels to sign a new musician at this time, the youths decided to start making music on their own with a very little budget. The music videos were very simple and not grand and expensive.
The availability of computers and cheap music editing software in the late 1990s and the first decade of the 21st century enabled Nigerian musicians to achieve higher quality recordings which quickly won over the Nigerian audience. This was a very cheap way to make music and a new Nigerian hip hop musician would like to make music and sell it on a CD. This was one way for the youths to be independent from the government by being lucrative and creating jobs for themselves, since the government was not helping them. Hip hop was used during this time for entertainment, but also to criticize the government to demand change. Groups and solo artists during that period include the likes of Junior & Pretty, Daniel 'Danny' Wilson, Plantashun Boiz, Remedies with members Eedris Abdulkareem, Eddy Remedy & Tony Tetuila. The late 90s and the early years of the new millennium saw an outburst of artists and groups, many returning home from the Western Diaspora, like eLDee da Don of Trybesmen, U.G.O, Madarocka and the S.O.U.R.C.E. Intl Clique, Naeto C of W.F.A, and from Europe, JJC and the 419 squad became a part of mainstream Nigerian music after the collapse of pop trends like Yo-pop.
These up-rising artists in Nigeria began to localize hip hop and make songs in English and any other Nigerian language as a means of self-expression, thus making Nigerian hip hop multilingual. Just as Nigeria's Nollywood movies have done with Western movies, Nigerian hip hop has begun to displace Western popular music. Musicians such as Eedris Abdulkareem started making multilingual hip hop music and the lyrics were usually in English, Pidgin English and another Nigerian language such as Yoruba, Igbo, and Hausa.
Hip-Hop World Magazine, based in Nigeria, is a prominent publication that has helped fashion the orientation of hip hop culture in Nigeria and across the continent. African Beatz, Blast and Bubbles magazines are other similar major Nigerian hip hop publications.
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